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Similar to yourself, I thought that reaching out to POIs without a specific reason may be pointless. As such, the only POIs I reached out to were professors who I heard might not be taking graduate students, might be retiring, or transferring to another university. In my experience, this didn't seem to hurt as I secured an interview invitation at my top choice, without frequent communication with my POI.

In short, I don't think that failing to reach out to your POI is a deciding factor in the admissions decisions, so I wouldn't worry about it! 😄

@villageelliot I found it is important to read each program's instructions carefully! For example, UC Santa Barbara offers this guideline on preparing your statement of purpose:

"BEFORE submitting your application, we strongly encourage you to contact one or more faculty members with whom you would like to work. Discuss your research interests with faculty members. Please include the names of faculty who might serve as a mentor in your statement of purpose. No student will be admitted unless the appropriate professor consents to mentor that student through his/her course of study at UCSB."

Fortunately, I did find a receptive POI... though I still haven't heard anything since submitting my app. 😑

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@villageelliot I found it is important to read each program's instructions carefully! For example, UC Santa Barbara offers this guideline on preparing your statement of purpose:

"BEFORE submitting your application, we strongly encourage you to contact one or more faculty members with whom you would like to work. Discuss your research interests with faculty members. Please include the names of faculty who might serve as a mentor in your statement of purpose. No student will be admitted unless the appropriate professor consents to mentor that student through his/her course of study at UCSB."

Fortunately, I did find a receptive POI... though I still haven't heard anything since submitting my app. 😑

It seems like people are misunderstanding me. I did 100% reach out to every POI I had and all but 1 responded to me.

My worry is it seems people on here had persistent contact throughout the application process with their POI's, which I did not.

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One question I have for the group: how much contact did you all have with your POI's? I reached out to all of them before applying to introduce myself and make sure they were taking new PhD students but that was it for the most part. It seems like many of you had repeated contact with POI's throughout the process. Is that the norm? Did I mess up here by not staying in touch? I just didn't have questions and so I felt that reaching out to them throughout the process without actually needing anything seemed at best pointless and at worst harmful to my application.

It sounds like your approach was fairly similar to my own. After my initial round of program research, I emailed professors at each school with research interests complementary to my own. I asked if they were taking new grad students, briefly explained why I think my research interests are relevant to theirs, and said that I would be glad to speak further if they were so inclined. Some of those emails never got responses, some led to me crossing programs off my list, some turned into substantive email conversations, and a few professors asked to speak to me over the phone. Most of those conversations took place during July-October, so I didn't have contact during the actual preparation of my application.

I viewed this process mostly as part of my research on where to apply, rather than having any significant bearing on those application outcomes.

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It seems like people are misunderstanding me. I did 100% reach out to every POI I had and all but 1 responded to me.

My worry is it seems people on here had persistent contact throughout the application process with their POI's, which I did not.

Ah, I see. Yeah, I don't even understand how persistent contact is possible in some cases. Some POIs gave me initial encouragement and cheerily suggested that I send over any other questions, and when I did, never got back to me. That said, my sole acceptance so far (Oregon) came through a POI with whom I had a few back/forth emails.

Edited February 13 by sickeagle

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It sounds like your approach was fairly similar to my own. After my initial round of program research, I emailed professors at each school with research interests complementary to my own. I asked if they were taking new grad students, briefly explained why I think my research interests are relevant to theirs, and said that I would be glad to speak further if they were so inclined. Some of those emails never got responses, some led to me crossing programs off my list, some turned into substantive email conversations, and a few professors asked to speak to me over the phone. Most of those conversations took place during July-October, so I didn't have contact during the actual preparation of my application.

I viewed this process mostly as part of my research on where to apply, rather than having any significant bearing on those application outcomes.

That's good to hear! That's exactly how I went about it. Basically identical experiences lol

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@ssmall1 Fellow lurker here. I applied to the MA program at UGA as well and got an email from the department on February 7th notifying me that I was admitted. (I posted it on the results page but apparently didn't select the correct drop down option for the school...off to a strong start!)

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@villageelliot, my experience was also similar to yours in terms of contacting POIs. Some exchanges were brief and to the point (replies along the lines of "yes I am taking students and will look out for your application") and others turned into longer conversations; perhaps over the span of a few days but never much more than that. But I didn't reach out again when these conversations naturally seem to come to an end, I definitely didn't "force" any contact after that because of the reasons you and others have mentioned. For what it's worth, I had no prior contact with the person I will likely work most closely with if I end up at Duke (I reached out quite late, and she was on research leave at the time), so don't worry too much!

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@ssmall1 Fellow lurker here. I applied to the MA program at UGA as well and got an email from the department on February 7th notifying me that I was admitted. (I posted it on the results page but apparently didn't select the correct drop down option for the school...off to a strong start!)

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Thanks @Karou! I'm kind of in shock, to be honest. I spent an extra year in my MA program after I decided to apply to doctoral programs so I could really focus on applications, and I think that paid off.

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Oh very good to know! I was told mid February after my interview but my POI might’ve been mistaken.

I did not ask during my interview with UPenn, but from the results history, "mid-February" seems to be around the 23rd. There was a year they were sent a week earlier, but it remains to be seen. Rejections typically come out in March, I believe.

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I really think it puts some schools at a disadvantage for not responding sooner. I only have a Yale acceptance right now, and all I can do day and night is plan my future there! I interviewed with UPenn but until they actually accept me, I can't consider it a possibility and have tried to pushed it to the back of my mind (mostly to not get too disappointed).

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Hey everybody! I received an informal acceptance from a DGS today, telling me they recommended me to the GS, that they hope I consider their program, and that visiting details will follow. How would you recommend responding? Paging @urbanhistorynerd since you mentioned corresponding with a POI after an informal acceptance. Thank you everybody for the help and best of luck!

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I only have a Yale acceptance right now, and all I can do day and night is plan my future there! I interviewed with UPenn but until they actually accept me, I can't consider it a possibility and have tried to pushed it to the back of my mind (mostly to not get too disappointed).

This is exactly how I feel! At the beginning of this process Yale and Harvard HEAL were first and (a close) second choice for me, but now that I got into Yale I'm just looking at apartments and all the restaurants in New Haven I want to eat at! I'm really curious what the Harvard outcome will be, but Yale feels like the only real option for me at the moment. Especially because the Harvard decision is taking so long to release!

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I really think it puts some schools at a disadvantage for not responding sooner. I only have a Yale acceptance right now, and all I can do day and night is plan my future there! I interviewed﻿ with UPenn but until they actually accept me, I can't consid﻿er it a possibility and have tried to pushe﻿d it to the back ﻿of my mind (mostly to not get too disappointed).

Same... Yale is the only place I have gotten in so far (number one choice, though), and I also had an interview with UPenn, but since they come out so late after the Yale decision (one week ago today!) I have gotten a head start on planning for Yale to the point where it starts to feel like things have been finalized, despite the fact that I have not even accepted the offer yet and am still waiting to hear back from other schools.